09-09-2014, 08:50 PM
Allusion should be used to add depth to the poem by linking it to other artistic works or occurrences that are culturally familiar. Obscure allusion is really just the writer having a bit more of a wank than usual -- it's like literary name-dropping. "Oh look at how many other things I've read, let me mention them all." (It's one of the reasons I almost completely despise T.S. Eliot, but that's another story.)
If an allusion is self-referential or some kind of in-joke, fine -- but the poem should work just as well without it, because most of your audience won't understand it. And if the poem works just as well without it, you might as well leave it out in the first place.
If an allusion is self-referential or some kind of in-joke, fine -- but the poem should work just as well without it, because most of your audience won't understand it. And if the poem works just as well without it, you might as well leave it out in the first place.
It could be worse